"(Lousy)!" he said, using a saltier adjective. "Would you expect otherwise?"

I laughed. Kasten didn't.

"Why is that funny?" Kasten said. "Don't laugh. That's rude."

Yes, the exchange tells you what kind of season it has been in Los Angeles, having the biggest player payroll in National League history but sitting in last place in the NL West with a major-league worst 6-18 record in divisional play.

Kasten remains optimistic about the future while still believing the Dodgers can win this year, and he hopes the two can go hand-in-hand.

They tried to win with their own players. They tried the free agent market. They tried trading prospects for players with big contracts.

Now, in the name of Yasiel Puig, they are hoping the international market pays off, resurrecting the glory days of Fernando Valenzuela and Hideo Nomo.

You know the hype in Los Angeles is surreal when everyone was talking about Puig on Monday, almost forgetting the Dodgers were facing San Diego Padres outfielder Carlos Quentin for the first time since April11, when a brawl resulted in a broken collarbone for Los Angeles starter Zack Greinke.

The Dodgers need a tourniquet as much as they need a five-tool outfielder: Six starting position players and five starting pitchers — total 2013 salary, $134 million — have spent significant time on the disabled list. Monday, Carl Crawford became the latest.

"Have you ever seen a team lose five starters in a week?" Kasten said, referring to Crawford, center fielder Matt Kemp, catcher A.J. Ellis and starting pitchers Chris Capuano and Hyun-Jin Ryu, who is expected to miss one start. "I've never seen that happen. I hate to make excuses for injuries, so I don't, but this is truly unprecedented this last week.

"Still, we are good enough to win the way we are. Hopefully, this is all short term."

Crawford's hamstring strain prompted Puig's call-up, but the Dodgers say their 22-year-old Cuban outfielder, who elicited comparisons to Bo Jackson during a torrid spring training, is not being summoned to rescue a season gone horribly wrong.

Then again, we've seen other Hollywood scripts with much wilder imaginations, so who knows? Puig was hitting .313 with eight homers and 37 RBI at Class AA Chattanooga, Tenn.

"Any time somebody walks into the stadium and gets an opportunity, it's a chance for the start of something big" Dodgers manager Don Mattingly told news reporters. "That's kind of the cool part, really. You don't know if you're going to end up seeing (Ken) Griffey Jr. or the next Fernando, or whoever it is.

"You saw with the Angels and Mike Trout, he came up and things turned around."

Kasten hates to dampen anyone's enthusiasm, least of all the guy putting Puig in the lineup. But before we start putting him in Subway commercials, can we at least see him play a couple of big-league games?

He has yet to even play a game at Class AAA.

"You can imagine what the last year of his life has been like, so I don't want to put too much pressure on him," Kasten says.

"We feel he's going to have a big future. We just don't know if it starts (Monday) or not. We don't know how long he's even going to be here.

"We just don't. And I've gotten really, really bad at predicting the future."

It was three months ago in spring training that Kasten and chairman Mark Walter predicted a future dynasty for the Dodgers. But entering the third month of the season, that future looks a few galaxies away.

"We have a long, long, ways to go yet, to where we need to be," Kasten says. "We're still playing catch-up, and it's going to take several years to catch up.

"It's not about the money, but doing a good job signing and evaluating."

The Dodgers might have hired 10 international scouts and signed 42 foreign players, but let's be honest:

It's still about the money.

The Dodgers don't get Puig unless they shell out $42 million for him. They don't get Ryu unless they outbid everyone with a $25.7 million posting fee to the Hanwha Eagles, signing him to a six-year, $36 million contract. And they won't get prized pitchers Masahiro Tanaka or Kenta Maeda from Japan in coming years unless they outspend everyone again.

With an $8 billion TV deal that should be finalized this year and a club-record 31,000 season ticketholders, the Dodgers will always have an advantage over their NL West competitors.

Then again, the rest of the league can be grateful the draft rules have been overhauled, preventing the Dodgers from outspending everyone in the amateur draft, too, with a $5.2 million limit this year. The international draft has been put on hold, but teams still are penalized for outspending their allotted monies for foreign players.

The loophole, of course, is that Asian players who are posted — and foreign professionals 23 or older — have no restrictions.

The next Puig or Ryu could still be coming to L.A., although Kasten insists they won't always have a $218 million payroll.

"I'm in favor of the (international) draft, under the right rules," he says. "But we will be aggressive and give our scouts a mandate to get more aggressive. Our plan is to build through the system."